We are thrilled to close out our 2015-2016 season with a reading of Ugo Edu’s Securing Ties on May 4th at 4PM in Zellerbach Room 7 (please note location change).

Securing Ties, based partially on Edu’s PhD fieldwork in Brazil, is a potent dramatic exploration of the politics of race and sexual health. We’re honored to partner with Rhodessa Jones’ “Performance: An African American Perspective” to make this reading a reality.

Ugo Edu is a medical anthropologist, currently completing a postdoctoral fellowship at San Francisco State University. This is her first full-length theatrical piece and is based on her dissertation research. This builds on her experience developing theatrical material and performing in a UC Berkeley Black Theater Workshop production entitled “At Buffalo” in 2011. She has assisted in data collection for a theatrical piece about the Freddie Gray murder in Baltimore and has been a collaborator with Brazilian choreographer Isaura Oliveira as dance and capoeira performer since 2014 with the Teatro Brasileiro de Danca: The Bahia in Oakland Collective stage production.

The reading will be directed by Joshua Williams and will be followed by a Q&A with the playwright. Free and open to the public.

We are so thrilled to be collaborating with our comrade-in-arms Kellen Hoxworth on The Summer Way. Read more about our wonderful guest director below and come to see his work on Wednesday at 4PM in Zellerbach Room 7.

Kellen Hoxworth is thrilled to be working with the TDPS New Play Reading Series. He is a doctoral candidate in the Stanford University Department of Theater & Performance Studies, and he is also a performer, dramaturg, and director. He has directed productions of A Kingdom a Country or a Wasteland, in the Snow by Lola Arias and Mud by María Irene Fornés (Stanford University), as well as Bedtime Stories by Charles Mee and This Is A Chair by Caryl Churchill (University of Pittsburgh); he also served as directing intern on productions of Dollhouse by Rebecca Gilman (Guthrie Theater), Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? by Edward Albee (Jungle Theater), and Sister Kenny’s Children (The History Theatre, St. Paul). He has served as production dramaturg for “Master Harold”…and the Boys by Athol Fugard and Breakfast with Mugabe by Fraser Grace (Aurora Theatre, Berkeley). He recently performed in fox mirror forest by Rebecca Chaleff and Rebecca Ormiston (Stanford University) and The Balcony by Jean Genet (The Collected Works).

We couldn’t be more thrilled to present a reading of Brandon Woolf and Maxwell Flaum’s The Summer Way on Wednesday, April 6 at 4PM in Zellerbach Room 7.

The Summer Way is a deep dive into our contemporary media maelstrom, inspired by the legendary disagreements of Norman Mailer and Marshall McLuhan. Race! Terrorism! Black and white cookies! Drones! Tony Soprano! This piece is everything (and nothing) you’d expect.

Brandon Woolfis a theater maker and a scholar of performance. He is the co-founder of two performance ensembles – Shakespeare im Park Berlin and the UC Movement for Efficient Privatization (UCMeP). Brandon is an alumnus of TDPS and the Program in Critical Theory at UC Berkeley (2007-2014). In 2016, he will be joining the Program in Dramatic Literature at NYU as a visiting assistant professor of theater. www.brandonwoolfperformance.com

Maxwell Flaum is a writer and co-founder of Shakespeare im Park Berlin. He hides in Germany.

We’re excited to welcome our own Joshua Williams back to the CDWG stage this March for a reading of his new work-in-progress. We don’t want to give away the surprise (and we might get sued if we did!) but suffice it to say it involves ghosts. And a monkey. Plus, it’s being directed by the amazing Caitlin Marshall and will be followed by a Q&A with the fantastic Takeo Rivera. So don’t miss it! Wednesday, March 9, 4PM, Durham Studio Theater.

We’re excited to kick off our spring 2016 line-up of new play readings with Jonathan Ceniceroz’s “The Cruise,” directed by Christian Nagler, on Wednesday 2/10 at 4PM in Durham Studio Theater. Free and open to the public.

In “The Cruise,” Ceniceroz explores the colonial histories and dark politics underneath the decadence of Caribbean cruise culture. Join us for a reading of the piece, followed by a discussion with the playwright facilitated by our own Martha Herrera-Lasso.

Jonathan Ceniceroz

Jonathan Ceniceroz is an American playwright and screenwriter whose work has been produced and developed by leading regional theaters throughout the United States. He is a native of Los Angeles and earned advanced degrees in writing from UCLA and Brown University.

Jonathan’s work often investigates the intersection of spiritual faith and the pragmatic needs of human desire. In addition, he explores the evolving definition of racial and sexual identity in the U.S. quite often in blunt and satiric terms. His writing provokes discussion and debate and is noted for its intrinsic honesty and high artistic quality. His most well-known works in theater are the plays, Lupe, Now! The Drowning of Natalie Wood, BIG BRO/lil broandHole in the Boy. In film he co-authored the international teen horror film, Kill Me Tomorrow and is the writer of Mousy Brown and Der Fisch. He was a 2012-2013 Member of the National Hispanic Media Coalition TV Writers Program where he wrote a popular episode of CASTLE and the original drama 7 MARES.

We’re thrilled to round out our Fall 2015 season with our own Christian Nagler’s new experimental play Family vs. Family on Wednesday, Dec. 2 at 4PM in Durham Studio Theater.

Christian Nagler – who is one of the 2015-2016 directors of the Contemporary Drama Working Group – is an artist and writer based in Oakland, California. He works at the intersection of bodily movement and geo-financial systems. Recent projects include Market Fitness, Yoga for Adjuncts, and Cosmoconvulsive Anxiothenics, which pursue economic critique through kinesthetic, participatory performances. Currently, he is doing graduate research on issues of performance in economic discourse and completing his first novel, The Capitalist.

Christian Nagler

Family vs. Family will be directed by Kimberly Skye Richards and will feature the students of the New Play Practicum.